by Ben Bova
“If only we could have met them, talked to them …”
“The Martians?”
“Yes. We can’t even read the writings they left.”
“They’ve given us their message, Vijay. The important message. They existed. There were intelligent beings on this world. There must be others out there, among the stars. We’re not alone.”
She sighed heavily. “But it’s just you and me here on Mars for the next four months.”
“Yes.”
“We’ve got a whole world to ourselves.”
“I love it here,” Jamie said.
“It’s peaceful,” she replied. “I’ll give you that.”
“Dex is going to have his hands full when he gets back. His father’s going to fight him every inch of the way.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Vijay said confidently. “Dex’s dad won’t cause that much trouble. He’ll win the old man over.”
“Do you think so?”
“He can charm a snake out of a bush when he wants to.”
Jamie said nothing.
“Even if he doesn’t,” Vijay went on, “Dex’ll raise enough money for a fresh expedition with his foundation.”
“It won’t be profitable,” Jamie said.
”You think not? Dex has ideas about virtual reality tours of Mars, y’know. See, feel, hear … the complete experience of being on Mars without the expense or inconvenience of leaving home. And selling Mars rocks, that sort of thing.”
Despite himself, Jamie gritted his teeth.
“He’ll make a profit, one way or the other, don’t you worry.”
“And pump it into further exploration.”
“You’ll see.”
The sun was high overhead. The soft winds of Mars murmured across the empty, rolling plain. Jamie saw the rocks and the worn rims of ancient craters and the dunes off in the distance, spaced as precisely as soldiers on parade. He looked down for the footprints of the long-extinct Martians and saw instead their own boot prints in the red dust and the cleat tracks of their tractors and rovers.
He looked out toward the horizon again and envisioned his grandfather Al out there, smiling at them. This is where our path has led, Grandfather, Jamie said silently. We’re home now.
“Do you love me?” Vijay asked.
A day earlier the question would have startled Jamie. But now he knew. Now there was no doubt in his mind, no conflict.
“Yes,” he said, unequivocally. “I love you, Vijay.”
Then she asked, “Do you love me more than Mars?”
He heard the smile in her voice. He hesitated, then answered, “That’s a completely different thing.”
Vijay laughed delightedly. “Good! I wouldn’t have believed you if you’d said yes.”
She grasped his gloved hand in hers and they turned back to the airlock hatch, ready to begin their first night alone on the planet Mars.
AUTHOR’S AFTERWORD
The story you have read is fiction, based as solidly as possible on the known facts about conditions on Mars. I have extrapolated from those facts, of course; that is the prerogative—and responsibility—of the novelist.
At this moment, no one knows if life once existed on Mars, or if life exists there now. No one knows, and we will not find out for certain until we explore our red-robed neighboring world much more thoroughly.
The idea that Mars once harbored an intelligent civilization may strike the reader as a fanciful speculation. Yet as of this writing, it is a speculation that cannot be disproved.
Not until we travel to Mars to search out its marvels for ourselves will we know for certain. Probably intelligent Martians never existed. Possibly there has never been life of any kind on the red planet. But we will find surprises on Mars, of that you can be sure. An entire world is there to be explored. A new age of discovery is soon to begin.
Mars waits for us.
Ben Bova
Naples, Florida
1998
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
The breathtaking continuation of a monumental SF epic, Ben Bova’s masterful sequel combines high-frontier adventure, cutting-edge science, evocative otherworldly atmosphere, and the vividly drawn characterizations that have become his trademark. It is a thrilling—and grittily realistic—tale of human and technological triumph in the early decades of our next century.
BEN BOVA has been a presence in science fiction for more than four decades. He is a past president of the Science Fiction Writers of America and the former editor of Analog. The recipient of the Hugo and other awards, he has written dozens of novels, including Mars, Voyagers, and Death Dream—as well as Moonrise and Moonwar, the first two books of his acclaimed Moonbase Saga. He lives in Florida with his wife, Barbara Bova.